Tag Archives: yellow

Photographs: Fall, Photographs: Fall Color, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Aspen Trees, Near-Peak Color

October 27, 2015 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A small group of aspens against a rocky slope are in full autumn color

Having visited this area a week earlier I was expecting a certain level of fall color in specific places along the shoreline of this eastern Sierra Nevada lake when I arrived here again early on October. I was also expecting to see quite a few other photographers, given that this is an accessible and well-known location. I was not disappointed on either count. As I arrived I found brilliant colors along the small dirt roadway, and I also found photographers everywhere — in the parking lots, along the shoreline of the lake, stopped in the middle of the road, wandering in grassy areas. There were even a few workshop groups collected together in promising spots.

I kept going, passing through the area of the most intense color. My idea was to find a location from which I could get a line back across the valley towards the trees, placing them against a backdrop of the gray texture of granite hillsides and cliffs, and contrasting that with the brilliant color of the leaves, made even more saturated by the cloudy, wet conditions. I found my spot, wandered up onto a slight rise with a clear view of the trees, and used a long lens to isolate them.

All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others as indicated. Any use requires advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

Photographs: Fall, Photographs: Fall Color, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Aspen Grove, Yellow and Green

October 20, 2015 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

The transition from green to yellow foliage in an eastern Sierra Nevada aspen grove

Aspen color is a more complex and fascinating thing than what if first seems — and that first impression is quite a strong one to begin with. The first thing most of us see when we learn about aspens is simply “brilliant color,” enhanced by the tree’s juxtaposition with other spectacular landscape elements and amplified when the trees are seen in vast and colorful groves. In fact, there are few things more astonishing than a huge grove of aspens at peak fall color, stretching up and across a sub-alpine landscape on a fall day.

Once you catch the aspen bug — and have seen quite a few of those vast and colorful groves — subtler things start to become interesting. There are too many elements to fully describe them all in this little post, but they include the patterns produced by the white trunks, almost regardless of leaf color. The color shadings are more varied than we first see — from the first lime-green hints of upcoming color change, through the spectrum of colors encompassing yellow and gold and red and orange and brown, and including the subtler effects of brown and black leaves late in the season. When I saw this vignette (within a much larger grove) my firs thought was perhaps “not quite at peak,” but I think that the combination of a few leaves just arriving at near-peak color against the background of leaves yet to change is pretty interesting, too, especially when the scene is cut through by those stark white trunks.

All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others as indicated. Any use requires advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

Photographs: Fall, Photographs: Fall Color, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Hillside Aspen Grove

October 16, 2015 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Colorful autumn aspen trees ascend a hillside in Bishop Canyon, California

I love to photograph aspens in soft light, either very early in the morning or in the evening, when the trees are in shadow. This light enhances the colors of the trees and it fills in the shadows, creating an appearance that does not have the stark quality sometimes seen in midday sunlight aspen groves. I waited until the last hour or so of daylight to photograph this area, at which time the sun has already dropped behind the summits of the surrounding peaks.

This photograph takes in a small section of a much larger grove of colorful trees, at every stage from fully green to complete bare. I sometimes like to simply stand for a bit in front of such a grove, staring at the colors and patterns and trying to find small sections that might make a composition. Here I think I was first attracted to the bright leaves on the small trees near the top, but soon I saw the diagonal arrangement of the rows of trees. Each row has its own character. That primary row near the upper part of the frame is at its color peak, but in front of it there is another row of trees that seems to be going more quickly from green to bare. In the background there is a line of much larger trees, with their tall and straight white trunks.

Photographs: Fall, Photographs: Fall Color, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Slender Aspens, Autumn

October 15, 2015 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Slender aspen trees with fall foliage grow high on a Sierra Nevada slope

Sierra Nevada aspens come in a tremendous variety of shapes and sizes. On rocky, dry slopes, where the trees seem to eke out an existence in truly marginal conditions, they are frequently small, with skinny branches and sometimes a bit of a haggard look. In other areas, perhaps influenced by the quality of the soil, they have stout trunks but never get very tall, instead growing in bent and twisted shapes. In a few places, often in the bottom of valleys, they may take on the classic aspen shape — tall trees with straight trunks — though this is less common in the Sierra than in some other places. Sometimes they grow very high on rugged slopes, like the trees in this photograph, and while they are relatively straight and shapely trees, they are also very small.

This group grows high on a slope above an area of dense, tall, and thick aspens, and those other trees usually attract more attention with their dense leaves and intense fall colors. But sometimes I almost like these smaller trees more, especially when some of their leaves have fallen and their bare, white trunks are more visible. Even more, I like to photograph them early and late in the day, when the light reflected into shaded areas warms and intensifies the colors and fills in the shadow.s

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: yellow

Aspen Grove, Yellow and Green

Hillside Aspen Grove

Slender Aspens, Autumn

Photographer and visual opportunist. Daily photos since 2005, plus articles, reviews, news, and ideas.